Home > Stocks / Aktien > Why not grab some shares of Markel? Top quality at a low price!

Why not grab some shares of Markel? Top quality at a low price!

November 11th, 2011

Markel Corporation (NYSE: MKL), a high quality insurance company many people compare to Berkshire Hathaway, released its Q3 and 9 months 2011 earnings these days.

They reported net earnings of $ 5.48 /share, lower than the $ 6.48 they earned same quarter last year.

The combined ratio jumped to 100% from 93% in Q3 2010 due to higher losses related to natural catastrophes and due to 2 programs „now in run-off that were exposed to losses associated with the adverse conditions in the residential mortgage market”

Book value per outstanding common share increased only 2% from $ 326.36 to $ 333.11 this year.

But gross written premium volume was just under $ 1.8 billion, up 16% for the 9 months compared to last year.

The Earnings Call Transcript you can find here on Seeking Alpha.

Their investment results were impacted by the market conditions we all know but they managed to reach an overall investment return of their portfolio of 2.8 % so far this year.

As Markel becomes more and more a diversified holding company and is build for long term return we have to keep an eye not only on their public investment portfolio but also on „Markel Ventures”, where they acquire control interest in non-publically traded companies:

Through the first nine-months, other revenues at Markel, which are largely those of the Markel venture company, were $260 million versus 125 million in the prior year, an increase of more than 100% as Chief Investment Officer Tom Gayner explained on the Earnings Call.

Markel’s stock yesterday closed at $ 389.85

It trades at a book value / share of just 1.2 which historically is a very low valuation for this top quality company.

So why not grab some shares ?

Categories: Stocks / Aktien Tags:
Comments are closed.